“When I moved to San Francisco from New York last year, I knew I’d have to give up on some of the staples I grew up on: the corner slice, New York-style hot dogs, pastrami, and the like. Really great bagels were on that list, too. What I didn’t know back then was that I would end up finding a great bagel shop in the Bay Area—and that it would serve some of the best bagels I’ve had anywhere in the world, including New York. Beauty’s bagels are perfectly sized (that is, not as big as your face) with an intensely blistered, crackly, eggshell-thin crust that reveals a dense, chewy crumb with well-developed flavor. They’re ostensibly Montreal-style in that they’re boiled and then baked in a wood-fired oven. Thankfully, though, they don’t follow the no-salt-in-the-dough mandate that some Montreal bagel shops stick with, nor do they have that Montreal honey sweetness. Sure, their everything bagels are a little sparse on the toppings, but I love the scattering of fennel seed they add. It’s not a traditional flavor, but it works. Like all good bagels, you should order them from the shop and eat them within half an hour. And for the love of god, please don’t toast them.”